My Travel Highlights from 2018 (As per Google!)

Since we share so much location data with Google, the end of year is probably is good time to see it at one place.This is probably one of the good things Google does with your data – it organised your travel in a nice timeline with an email digest! (Yes, there are beautiful sides of tech too – all depends on how you use it).Anyway, so here’s my 2018 as per Google.The Overview This is very accurate in terms of the cities and countries but I’m sure I’ve visited many more places than 116. And 10 is a good number of countries considering you don’t want to rush things and stay at least a month per country. And a little more where family is. In my case, that’s India.Around the worldThis calculation makes no sense though it’s a fun fact. Going around the world is not the point – the real thing is to experience cultures, people, cuisines, and life itself.Mode of TransportThis has to be the most inaccurate of all the stats. The walking and cycling seems to be calculated only when I had my phone on me because the calculate estimates by walking at around 1.6 km / day and I’m quite sure I’ve walked much more than that (on average) but without the phone. And the countless hours I’ve spent on boats on sea don’t seem to show up here. 100 kms cycling is not bad I want to push that number up this year. That being said, I don’t want to carry my phone or some tracker every time.Furthest TripAnother interesting fun-fact kind of thing. When they say ‘furthest’, they mean from my ‘home location as per Google records’ which would be India. That’s interesting because I never thought about ‘how far’ I’m going from India.Longest TripAnother interesting showcase. I’m sure India and Vietnam are correctly shown here. But I do know that I spent more time in Austria than Cambodia. Perhaps Google is taking all these 3 countries as one trip. Would like to find out more about this.This is kind of a cool thing to see end of the year.And since I’ve quit most social media, I’ve only been using Google Maps as a ‘check-in’ so I have a record of where I’ve been.Great life. Cheers!